Tuesday, 9 December 2014

inspirational companies

Companies, partnerships and individuals with strong business models exist throughout the world of photography and modern digital imaging and media. The companies or collaborations that I am looking at I picked because they all run in the same direction that I want to take my photography, editorial and photojournalism. Vice Media LLC, Magnum Photos and Amber Film and Photography Collective cic. are the different companies I will be looking at. They all have very different approaches to business within the creative industries, but all manage to survive successfully.Vice Media LLC Vice Media is a current affairs and lifestyle media platform, with free magazine publication and a wide range of videos and documentaries filmed around the world on all kinds of issues. Vice is so successful because it is much more modern and up to date than its rivals such as BBC, CNN who's internet presence is far weaker than that of vice. Aimed at at the youth and digital savy vice has exploded, tackling a wide range of subjects from filming inside North Korea to tracking down the illegal arms dealers who buy and sell nuclear weapons. Vice has no cost to the end user, the magazines are free and the videos are posted online regularly with no cost to the user, this encourages very large amounts of people to access their material. The profit comes in the form of advertising and now a vast portion comes from licensing the airing of their productions to different TV networks. vice has moved from being the small publication it started out as and is now a media empire worth over $2.5 billion.

Magnum Photosset up in 1947 Magnum Photos is a co-operative of photographers from around the world who aim to document the world and its events as they unfold, keeping a reference of almost all major events to have occurred since Magnums formation. Magnum acts as an agent to its members giving them access to areas and stories that would otherwise be impossible to broadcast. At Magnums core is an ethic of pure documentary that remains free political agenda and propaganda, this is one of its key reasons for formation shortly after WW2.

Amber Film and Photographic Collective cic.I have always had close ties with this company, all my life amber has been a driving creative force in my work. My father worked closely with amber films for many years, acting in several of their films and the subject of some of Sirka-Liisa Konttinen's photography. They aim to closely document the life of people of the north east, through photography and film. They have a collection of over 28,000 photographs and 100 films. Their work is renowned around the world, the body of work "Byker" by Sirka-Liisa Konttinen, created for Amber Films was the first pice of photography to show in the British Council in China since the cultural revolution. Her narrative work and the surrounding films produced by Amber have also been added to the "UK Memory of the World Register" a compilation of documents, archives and documentaries deemed highly important to the record of British history. Amber films it's self is a Community Interest Company meaning that it exists to serve the local community and its interests as opposed to maximising profit margins.